International Fellowships

Applications for AAUW International Fellowships are open August 1–December 1.

International Fellowships are awarded for full-time study or research in the United States to women who are not U.S. citizens or permanent residents. Both graduate and postgraduate studies at accredited U.S. institutions are supported.

Applicants must have earned the equivalent of a U.S. bachelor’s degree by September 30, 2014, and must have applied to their proposed institutions of study by the time of the application. Up to five International Master’s/First Professional Degree Fellowships are renewable for a second year.

Recipients are selected for academic achievement and demonstrated commitment to women and girls. Recipients return to their home countries to become leaders in business, government, academia, community activism, the arts, and sciences.

About the Fellowships

Originally designed to provide Latin American women opportunities for graduate and postgraduate study in the United States, the International Fellowships program awarded its first fellowship in 1917. The program now includes women from around the world, and International Fellowships have been awarded to more than 3,300 women from more than 130 nations.

Esther Ngumbi (2007–08), a Kenyan entomologist and motivational speaker nominated for One World Action’s 100 Women: The Unseen Powerful Women Who Change the World list. She is committed to work in Kenya and other African countries to develop sustainable farming and a science and leadership center.

Marina Núñez del Prado (1940–41) became one of Bolivia’s premiere artists. Her most famous work, Mother and Child, is part of the permanent collection at the National Museum of Women in the Arts in Washington, D.C.

Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala

Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala (1977–78), named one of Time magazine’s most influential people in 2014, is a prominent development economist and reformer who has dedicated most of her career to the World Bank and to her native Nigeria. She is currently serving her second term as minister of finance for Nigeria, Africa’s most populous nation and one of the world’s fastest-growing economies.

Before becoming finance minister in July 2011, Okonjo-Iweala was managing director of the World Bank, where she oversaw an $81 billion portfolio for projects in Africa, South Asia, Europe, and Central Asia. She served her first term as Nigerian finance minister between 2003 and 2006, when she also briefly took on the role of minister of foreign affairs — becoming the first woman to hold either position in Nigeria.

Okonjo-Iweala earned a bachelor’s degree in economics from Harvard University and a doctoral degree in regional economics and development from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Her doctoral studies were supported by her AAUW fellowship. She also holds honorary doctorates from Brown University, Trinity College, Dublin, and the University of Pennsylvania.

Tererai Trent (2001–02), a native of Zimbabwe, scholar, motivational speaker and humanitarian. She was featured in Nicholas Kristof’s book Half the Sky and has appeared on the Oprah Winfrey Show, where she was named Oprah’s all-time favorite guest.